Shield of Innocence (Alternate Places Book 4) (21 page)

That got strange looks, but no
one questioned it. After all, just because most people did the path of their
life differently, that didn't mean that Big Shadow had to.

Don took a breath.

"Okay. Great. Well, so much
for hanging with
him
for Christmas this year? Or is he still there,
too?"

Zack didn't know and didn't know
how to explain it.

"I think the answer is yes
and no. I think he's around, but that he won't be really, until after this is
handled, because it wasn't the last time he experienced it? It's a bit messed
up, but hey, it will be fine, I think."

Kate nodded, gave him a hug, and
then looked at everyone.

"So, no throwing Brit in
there to see if she can do it? That would be cool, if she could, being a
twin." It also wasn't going to happen. Britney and Blain were the same
person, more or less. A lot more so than regular siblings would be. Blain
stayed a boy most of the time, but only so they wouldn't have two identical
super hot identical girls at the school really. That and he was a bit stronger
and faster as a male, which helped with his fighting practice.

Even if Britney could have done
it, now that Blain
hadn't
, Zack figured that she never would.

Unless he could figure out how to
get Blain to do it first. The big issue seemed to be in how willing a person
was to be open minded, more than anything else. Everyone was different that
way, and human creativity seemed to be part of the equation, but not the whole
thing. Mages were basically human so that made sense, and vampires once had
been, but Alede could do it too. They were wonderful beings, but none of them
wrote songs, or painted pictures. They didn't write stories, unless the tales
were porn. Even then, the things weren't ever fresh or new, just retellings of
things they'd seen, possibly with the names changed.

They could be smart, but doing
anything truly novel was really difficult for them. It was true for most other
groups as well.

Yet here they were with two
Kaitlyn's that could do it. She was a great person, but not exactly an artistic
genius.
Smart
, truly, but that wasn't the same thing.

So whatever was stopping Blain
might be something they could handle, if he worked at it hard enough.

That would have to come later
however, since he wasn't hanging out in the void with anyone else for a while.

It took nearly two hours and
entry into two different realities to tell all the line walkers not to hang out
in the void for the time being. The whole time Zack wondered if going through
the empty black would be enough to have him found, but it honestly didn't seem
to be a problem. He was nearly certain that Big Shadow would have been able to find
him that way, since it was how they'd hunted demons together.

That this earlier version of the
being, and that really did feel right, now that he analyzed the whole thing,
just didn't know how to do things like that yet. Even the attempts to kill Zack
had been more than a little clumsy, just blasting out power and a roiling of
space in an attempt to destroy him. If so, that could work to his advantage, at
least in potential.

For some reason, and he didn't
know why, or how it might have happened, the beings that wished to invade what
he thought of as real space, those monstrous creatures in the place beyond the
void itself, had, and roughly held to, rules. For instance it wasn't considered
fair to send anything after him that was too far out of his league. Which
didn't mean that they wouldn't bring in arch-demons, or even several at once,
to try and take him down.

Which...

The idea shook him a bit as he
finally got to Lesser Shia, deciding to take a late shift. After all, if he was
supposed to be a gateway, an entry line into reality, that part kind of made
sense. They wouldn't be trying to really
destroy
him, but rather push
Zack into opening a way into that far off realm that didn't exist. In a way,
pushing him with creatures that weren't able to kill him instantly made sense.
Several times now he'd had to do things that were creative and different to
survive. Even becoming Maria the other day on his own had been that.

So there might be a plan in place,
rather than just things being tossed his way. A conditioning program, designed
to make him into what those other things wanted him to be. If that was so, then
everything, all reality, was in danger.

Hathe wasn't in the node room,
but there was a guard, who smiled at him, looking like a normal enough human
man. True, one with blue hair, that had slightly shiny skin that reflected the
overhead light, but that was probably cosmetic. Most of the people that he'd
met had been basically human, he realized. It spoke to where he was in the
scheme of reality, more than anything else. There were reptilians, and bird
like people too, but most of those he met, regardless of what they looked like
on the outside, were like he was.

In an infinite reality scheme,
that wouldn't be the truth for most places.

"Hi! I was planning to see
if anything needed to be done here? My schedule has been a bit messed up for a
few days." He hadn't missed anything however, and the guard shrugged,
clearly not understanding him. English wasn't the language of Lesser Shia after
all. If they even had one, Zack wasn't certain what it would be.

A translator in blue was called,
and the fellow, and Zack was nearly certain it was one from their shadow,
explained that the other line walkers had done everything for the time being.
Then, rather pleasantly, he was told to leave and possibly to go and do
something
fun
.

That actually baffled him for a
moment.

It had been a very long time
since he'd done anything like that, after all. It seemed a bit wrong to him, if
he were going to be honest about it.

Thankfully, when he got back to
Something Wonderful, there was a stack of envelopes for him, with hand drawn pictures
of who he was supposed to take them to, as well as names and some specific
information. This was, he realized, from Riley. That part of things left him
feeling suspicious, because he didn't know if it was a trick or not, but they
were just envelopes, and not bombs or anything.

Zack knew, because he looked at
each of them, and
asked
. Their shadows explained the basic contents to
him, which was baffling as often as not, but seemed to be informative, rather
than harmful. Like the Trickster really
was
just trying to get
everything together. To make reality come out in the best way possible.

Being clever like he was, Zack
decided to try taking the first one to the person that was named right then,
having time for it thanks to the others. Looking at the picture, he tried to
get a sense of the whole thing first, then looked into the node, using it like
a very good crystal ball. One that didn't show the future, specifically, but
that could show him
everything
else, if he used it right. The place he
ended up looking into was a bit plain seeming to him, being a solid purple and
black room, but the man he wanted was there. Grabbing the envelope from the
table, he stepped through, ending up about fifteen feet from the guy.

Who was insanely
huge
. He
was also incredibly pretty looking. His face was delicate, which shouldn't have
been possible, given his size. Seven and a half feet tall, or more. Zack
smiled, knowing that he wasn't being seen yet. That was clear, because when the
man spun, he had a glowing piece of stone on his hand. That was white, but with
blue arcane symbols all over it. At least from what he could see between the
large and powerful looking fingers.

The man spoke to him, his words
familiar, but not really recognizable. It was like listening to German really.
It was nearly sensible to him, but a lot of the words just missed what was
needed. His shadow, thankfully, spoke far more clearly.

They nearly always did.

"Who are you?" It was a
simple enough idea, though it might not actually have matched what was said
perfectly, since there were more words than would be needed to say that. At
least in English. He tried to project, in case the man could understand him
that way.

The shadow around him bulged out,
into a bubble of some kind, as he spoke.

"Hello! I'm Zack Hartley.
Um, from a different reality? I guess, if I have this right, that I'm pretty much
you? Which... Well, I think we can see who got the looks in the family. Anyway,
I have a letter for you. I'll just point at it a few times and leave it on this
table over here?" He moved slowly, but wasn't blasted across the room, or
beaten by the huge man.

He smiled a lot, and after a bit
the other fellow did, too.

"I can't really understand
you. You're speaking the language of the Ancients, right? English?" The
brown eyed man was watching him closely, so Zack nodded and moved away from the
missive just as slowly. He was picking up more of what was being said now, but
it was mainly informed by the man's shadow.

"Right. English. I... Don't
know how to explain this to you. You need to read this?" If the man could.
Then, if the letter wasn't in a language he could read, that was Riley's fault.

The giant got that the paper
envelope, a large manila colored thing, was for him however, since his name was
on it. That was explained with a
sense
of that being true, rather than
words. Then, oddly enough, the man bowed to him, going low. Zack did it back,
trying not to be clumsy about it, and then stepped back into the node that was
right there.

That had been handy, since
otherwise he'd have ended up chasing the man all over the place, and from the
feeling of things the strange room they were in wasn't around Earth at all, but
was
far
off in space. Luckily the whole thing was inside a node point.
Standing in a place that was pretty much not really there.

Back in Something Wonderful he
took the second envelope carefully, and looked at the name on it, which was in
English this time. Hopefully that boded well for him. Gwen Farris.

That sounded like a girl to him,
but Zack knew that half of all the human versions of him in other places would
be female. That just made sense. He kind of expected to find a dark girl with
big brown eyes that looked like Maria, given that. What he found however, was a
woman jogging in the woods, alone, wearing a tan jumpsuit, sturdy leather boots,
and looking like a much plainer version of Kaitlyn. Far too much so for it to
have been coincidence however. This time there was a node about fifty miles
away, which meant tracking her through various shortcuts. He stepped out in
front of her, about sixty feet down a dirt path, that being the nearest
location to her.

The woman dropped to the ground,
pointed a finger at him, and fired a line of force at him. Seeing it coming he
managed to fling himself to the side, and faked a laugh.

"Hey! Don't kill
me
,
I'm just the delivery boy!" It was kind of true, but for a second he
didn't know if the woman would be able to understand him. Her shadow was
different than her outer form, but she had
two
of them inside. That got
him to stare, since he'd never noticed that before. The other one wasn't Maria
either, however. Though it was the one in control.

"Um, sorry. I normally don't
get packages out here." The woman was thin looking and breathing harder
than a healthy person should be, he realized. She also hid it well, trying not
to seem weak in front of him. Just in case he was really there to try and kill
her, which was possible, given her life. "Those tend to come to the front
door."

Her English was as good as his
though, so he smiled. They even had similar accents.

"That seems about right. I'm
Zack Hartley, and well, I'm actually from another reality. I have a letter for you?
It's from a Trickster, so keep that in mind." He held the big envelope
out, and naturally the woman didn't move at all. She just stood there, staring
at him.

Finally, she gave him a smile
that seemed forced, and a bit drawn. Like she was working past feeling a bit
ill.

"Right. That makes no sense
to me. Except the part about being from a different reality.
I
am, so I
guess that could happen. Gwen Farris. Pleased to meet you, Zack? I don't
suppose that you're here to get me home?"

He shook his head, then shrugged.

"I
can
do that, since
it's pretty much my day job, but I doubt it, really. If you want to do that we
can? Even if you just want to visit. Mainly I'm just giving you this letter. I
think, if Riley didn't lie to me, that you're
me
. From a different
world, obviously. Probably the shadow inside you that is in control, since the
other one looks like my adopted daughter, Kate. She's a line walker, like me.
Also
an Alede... Which is a succubus, more or less?" It was probably too much
information to dump on someone you'd just jumped in the woods, but the woman
nodded, seeming a little tired. Then, probably being a bit too trusting, she
held her hand out for the package.

"That sounds insane enough
to be real. So do I read this now and... I don't know."

Zack didn't either. There were no
instructions on the thing. Not for him.

"If you want? The last guy
didn't. Huge man. Really pretty, too. I feel
totally
inferior now, by
the way. So far all the other versions of me have been better looking than I
am." Which was true enough. Then, someone had to be the ugly one.

Gwen cleared her throat and gave
him a look that was more than a little bit wry.

"How many have you met?'

"Three, including you.
You're the first girl version however. What's that like? Never mind. Annoying.
I know that's what's it like being me most days anyway. I've
been
a girl
after all, so I know about that sort of thing."

She just nodded, broke the red
wax seal on the back of the thing, then sat directly on the ground, in the
dirt, tailor fashion. A sheath of papers was pulled out, and the text inside
was type written. Probably printed out, having been generated on a computer.
After a bit there was a gasp.

"Fuck. So this is about the
Elder Gods? I should have known that crap wasn't over." Then she looked up
at him, and winced. "Sorry about the language. Um... I'm going to have to
read all of this. It says that you and I need to make a regular appointment to
meet up? I can't go to your world, so you need to come find me. Let's call it
once a month for the time being? It doesn't say here really, but that seems
about right." She kept reading, her eyes scanning the page, with deep and
sudden inhalations every few paragraphs.

On the second sheet she carefully
placed everything back inside the envelope and shook her head. Then she stood,
and looked at him closely.

"This is so weird. Okay, so,
can we meet up like that? I can't let anyone here know about this yet, I don't
think. That might change. My friend Beth was there, when we closed the gate
last time." She looked at him, her face going hard. "We all nearly
died. This entire world. We can't let those things in here. We
can't
."

"Agreed. I'll try to be back
in about a month then? We can have coffee and discuss how different our worlds
are."

Gwen nodded, and smiled at him,
seeming a bit more genuine now. Like she really meant it.

"See you then. Try not to
scare me like this though. I don't know, come to the house and actually knock
next time?"